The Demon of Dakar aka The Demon from Dakar

Fifty-Two

“K. Rosenberg” it said in ivory letters on the noticeboard in the A-stairwell. Four flights of stairs, Sammy Nilsson observed.

He shot Beatrice a humorous look.

“Can you make it?”

Bea made a face and started to walk. Damn, they’re sensitive, he thought and followed.

The assignment of bringing someone in for questioning was routine for both of them, but even so the tension mounted at each floor they passed. Sammy Nilsson absently read the names on the doors they walked by: Andersson, Liiw, Uhlberg, Forsberg, Burman.

Bea stopped on the third floor and turned around.

“Will he resist?”

“I doubt it,” Sammy Nilsson said, but automatically checked with the weapon holster under his jacket with his hand. “Our Konrad is not known to be violent.”

They walked on up, taking a breather for a couple of seconds before Bea rang the doorbell. They listened at the door but heard nothing that indicated Rosenberg was home. Bea rang the doorbell a second time as Sammy Nilsson peered through the mail slot.

An hour later, after Sammy had called Lindell and the district attorney, the chairman of the condo association, arrived. He carefully examined their police identification before he put a key in the lock and opened the door.

Konrad Rosenberg was sitting in the only armchair in the living room, a dark red monster of a chair with a nubby, worn cover. Sammy Nilsson thought he looked pleased, perhaps it was the angles of his mouth that created this impression.

On the floor below his arm was a syringe.

“Well, I’ll be damned,” said the chairman, who had snuck in behind the police.

“Get out!” Bea snapped, and he obeyed immediately.

Ann Lindell was on her way to the day care when she was informed that Konrad Rosenberg was dead. She felt no grief, of course-she didn’t even know Rosenberg, and what she knew of him was hearsay. Nonetheless she shed a few tears because it was Berglund she immediately started to think about when Sammy Nilsson called and told her about the depressing scene in the shabby apartment in Tunabackar.

Rosenberg was in some way intimately connected to her colleague. Perhaps it was only the fact that Berglund so recently had talked about how the former drug addict appeared to have come into money, but perhaps it was deeper than this. Earlier in the day she had intended to call Berglund and ask how he was doing, but had lacked the courage. Then when Sammy delivered the news of Rosenberg’s death, she was overtaken with the enormity of grief, though not for Rosenberg-for how many people in depressing circumstances hadn’t she seen, and how much misery and death had she not had to deal with? No, it was the suddenness of death that rattled her.

It looked like an overdose, Sammy had said, but had added that nothing was certain. Lindell agreed. Nothing was more certain than death, and she increased her speed, performing an insane maneuver in order to get there faster.

The first thing she saw in the day care playground was Erik, who was kicking his way along on a tricycle. A couple of other children were nearby. Ann Lindell recited their names to herself: Gustav, Lisen, Carlos, and Benjamin.

Erik was wearing only a T-shirt. I hope he doesn’t catch a cold, she thought. But he was like that, it didn’t matter what you put on him, jackets and sweaters ended up being pulled off.

She walked up, lifted him off the tricycle, and took him into her arms.

“We’re going home,” she said.